Heaven And Hell

Written by Eric Kripke.

Directed by J. Miller Tobin.

Air Date: November 20, 2008.

Castiel and Uriel are all ready to fight their way through the Winchesters to get to Anna when, poof, they disappear. Anna smeared her blood on a mirror, making a very effective angel-vanishing rune thing.

The boys take her to Pamela. Remember her? Castiel burned her eyes out? She's still on the ball, however, and helps Anna remember what's really happening. Turns out Anna was an angel who fell from heaven. To do so, she had to cut out her Grace, which apparently is like cutting out your kidney with a butter knife.

Ruby, Sam, Dean and Anna go look for the Grace, because that will turn her back into an angel. The demons are still after them, so they can use Anna to hear angel talk, and the angels are after her to kill her for disobeying orders. The only safe option is to go back to being an angel, though she doesn't want to. Dean comforts her in the backseat of the Impala.

Ruby tries to cut a deal with Alastair, saying she'll give him Anna if he leaves her and the boys alone. He decides to torture her instead.

Uriel tells Dean if he doesn't give up Anna, they'll kill Sam. Anna understands, and faces it bravely, but kisses Dean first. Castiel, who "likes Dean", looks grumpy about this. She's about to be killed when the demons show up, a bloodied Ruby in tow.

The demons and angels have a showdown, the angels win, Anna steals her Grace back and Alastair disappears with her as she transforms back.

Tropes

After-Action Patch-Up: Blink and you miss it, but while Sam and Dean are talking about Anna near the beginning, you can see Ruby and Anna sitting together and Ruby fixing up Anna's slit wrists. That was nice of her.

Angel Unaware: Anna is revealed to be a literal example. She is made aware in this episode via hypnosis.

Apologetic Attacker: Castiel is sorry that he has to kill Anna and apologizes to her for it before he and Uriel are about to execute her. Anna, however, doesn't buy that he's genuinely sorry because she knows angels can't truly feel.

Call Back: Disturbingly, Anna's behavior with Dean is just like Ruby's with Sam, including the sex and You Are Not Alone speech. Later Uriel hints that Anna is using sex to manipulate Dean just as Dean suggested Ruby was doing to Sam.

Couldn't Find a Pen: Anna slits her wrists and uses her own blood to draw a symbol on the mirror that forces Castiel and Uriel away. It later turns out that the sigil she uses always requires blood when drawn.

Deal with the Devil: When she learns that Anna can't protect them without her missing Grace, Ruby tries to make one with Alastair: Anna for the safety of herself and the Winchesters. It backfires on her when Alastair decides to just capture her and torture the info out of her instead. It is revealed at the end of the episode that she had just been doing her part in Sam's plan.

Face Death with Dignity: At the barn, Anna resigns herself to being executed by Castiel and Uriel when Dean tells them where they are. She tells them just to make it quick. Subverted when her execution is put on hold by the angels and demons fighting.

Informed Flaw: The way Anna describes the angels, as emotionless "Perfect...like a marble statue. Cold...no choice...only obedience", to explain why she decided to become human contradicts how we actually see the angels act in the very same episode.

Kick the Dog: While Castiel knocks out Sam with just a finger touch, Uriel enjoys pounding on Dean.

Last Kiss: When Castiel and Uriel are about to kill her, Anna kisses Dean to show that she forgives him. It turns out that this is the last time that they will ever kiss and probably the last kiss that Anna herself ever has.

Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: When Anna was little, she insisted that Rich Milton wasn't her real dad. When Sam and Dean find out about it, they enlist Pamela's help to get the adult Anna to remember what she meant by that in the hopes that it might shed some light on why she's so special. Anna remembers that her real dad is God and that she herself is a Fallen Angel.

Must Not Die a Virgin: Played with. Anna isn't going to die but she won't be human anymore and, apparently, angels can't have sex. Well, she did list sex as one of the things she likes about being human.

Mystical Pregnancy: Amy Milton was infertile, but when Anna tore out her Grace and fell to Earth, she suddenly conceived a child (i.e. Anna). Whether Rich Milton is Anna's biological father (who had sex with Amy and contributed his sperm to Anna's conception) or not is left unclear.

No One Gets Left Behind: Due to her fear of Alastair and the angels, Ruby suggests that they subvert this trope and leave Anna to fend for herself. Sam shoots the idea down, though, playing the trope straight.

No Sell: Alastair is also immune to Castiel's smiting powers. He even begins to do a reverse exorcism on Castiel, but he's only able to do so since Uriel is killing his helpers. Two angels versus one demon, even Lilith, would be a short fight.

Offing the Offspring: Since falling, Anna has had a lifelong fear that her father (God) was going to punish her for disobeying by killing her. Given God's actual feelings on humanity and free will, though, He'd probably be extremely proud of her.

Our Angels Are Different: How different is expounded on a little bit here; they become human(-ish) if they lose their Grace, which Anna describes as "pure creation" (it even made a centuries-old oak tree within months of landing on Earth).

Political Correctness Gone Mad: Dean boasts of Bobby's panic room, with salt-coated walls that can keep out demons. Ruby, standing outside the room, adds, "Which I find racist, by the way."

Prophet Eyes: Pamela's plastic eyeballs are completely white, making them look similar to Lilith or Alastair's. She acknowledges this, but says it's good for business because it makes her look "extra psychic".

Anna's last name, Milton, given her role as a fallen angel, could be a shout-out to John Milton, author of Paradise Lost.

Soul Jar: The oak tree at the site of Anna's Grace's landing is where her Grace is stored. Uriel takes it before she can get to it and stores it in a vial around his neck. She just ends up nabbing that instead.

Stars Are Souls: Anna and her Grace's fall to Earth looked like meteorites.

Summon Bigger Fish: Sam's entire plan. He pits Alastair and the angels against each other. At one point, he even calls it Godzilla fighting Mothra.

Unspoken Plan Guarantee: Sam came up with the idea of Dean and Ruby giving away Anna's location to angels and demons so that the two sides would be too busy fighting each other to zero in on them. Of course, since the audience didn't see him telling them that, it just looks like they both betrayed Anna up until the aforementioned plan is actually brought up on-screen.

TV Tropes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from thestaff@tvtropes.org. Privacy Policy